The original approach considered similar steps to that applied for a shoulder machine that produced bone-in square cut pieces. The approach for deboning took a different direction, because of the complexities in separation steps in lamb forequarter deboning complex manoeuvring or manipulation of both the cutter and the primal piece.
A twin robot solution was initially considered to minimise the use of dedicated mechanisms and automation, whilst accommodating variability in deboning and primal shape and size. This approach was modified to a single robot cell with an integrated grasping and force sensing unit using a static powered cutter.
A first world prototype was developed for practical testing, which were conducted using shoulder primal pieces from a local butcher shop.